A union leader in Sudbury is calling on Northern Ontario to ‘push back’ against cuts to library services in the province.

“The Ford government is trying to claim that the losses they are inflicting are because of choices made by others. That is simply not true,” Mike Bellerose, president of CUPE 4705, which represents workers at Ontario Library Services-North (OLS-North), said in a release.

“Our members’ livelihoods are being destroyed – vital services that remote, rural and Indigenous communities depend on are disappearing, and responsibility lies solely with Doug Ford and the rest of the government currently occupying Queen’s Park. I call on Northerners to make their voices heard in their communities, in the MPPs’ constituency offices and in the streets,” he said.

CUPE said that for 30 years, OLS-North and its southern counterpart, Southern Ontario Library Services (SOLS) have provided support to hundreds of public libraries across the province including inter-library loans, book delivery and staff training. They also help libraries pool costs on a number of fronts to achieve operational efficiencies, Franchetto said.

Those services have been suspended.

Following the tabling of the provincial budget on April 11, the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport informed management of OLS-North and Southern Ontario Library Services that their budgets were being cut by 50 per cent.

At OLS-North, five of 11 full-time employees have received layoff notices, while a sixth employee will see their position downgraded to a part-time job.

“These cuts may have decimated our membership, but they have also strengthened our resolve to push back against a government that is clearly out of touch with the needs of its constituents,” Bellerose said. “We hope that others across Northern Ontario share our resolve.”

He urged residents – particularly in communities represented provincially for the PC Party of Ontario – to contact their MPPs to “apply massive pressure to stop a destructive agenda that clearly isn’t ‘for the people’ in our communities.”

The provincial government said the decision was made to help address the province’s $11.7-billion deficit.

In an April 18 statement, Michael Tibollo, the minister of Tourism, Culture and Sport that oversees Ontario’s library system, said that the government is “maintaining the base funding for our libraries across the province” and that Ontario Library Services has no involvement in the daily operations of Ontario’s public libraries.

“This government will continue to maintain strong partnerships with municipal and Indigenous libraries and assist them in providing quality public services for everyone, while ensuring value for money and respect for taxpayer dollars,” the statement said.

However, library officials across the province have condemned the cuts. Mellissa D’Onofrio-Jones, the CEO of Ontario Library Service North, said she was surprised by the government’s decision.

“(We are) looking at the reduction and evaluating services keeping First Nations and public libraries in the north, and their unique needs, in our minds as we’re making decisions,” she said.

In a letter to Postmedia Network, Susan Warren, the retired CEO of Rideau Lakes Public Library, said the budget cuts would be “disastrous.”

“This service has been part of libraries in Ontario since at least 1965. As a teenager in Sydenham, it opened up wonderful new worlds for me. As an adult living in rural areas, it was always a lifeline to the bigger world. Our local libraries can only afford so many books and other services,” Warren wrote.

“With interlibrary loan, we were able to share our resources and resources from other libraries across the entire province by courier or by mail. It was a wonderful example of how economies of scale can work.”

Green party Leader Mike Schreiner said the library service budget has been frozen for 20 years and now it’s being cut.

“I think it will have negative effects on all communities, big and small, but particularly rural communities who don’t have as big a property tax base to support the funding of local libraries,” he said. “They rely on provincial funding and to have that funding cut means less access, and in particular I’m thinking less digital access which already, rural communities, many of them have limited access to broadband, internet and other digital services.”